In May Medicare started sending Medicare recipients their new Medicare cards. The new unique
Medicare number or Medicare Beneficiary Identifier (MBI) will replace the current Health Insurance
Claim Number (HICN) – patient’s social security number (SSN). All social security numbers will be
removed from Medicare cards by April 2019. CMS is putting this into law to protect people with
Medicare from fraudulent use of SSN’s.
The MBI is a random number that will consist of alpha and numeric characters. Should you have access
or receive a copy of your patient’s Medicare cards, please forward them to RCM with your other billing
documents. We need to ensure these numbers are input correctly to avoid delays in payment.
The following schedule will help you to know when the Medicare beneficiaries in your state should be
expecting to receive their replacement cards. There will be a grace period to bill with either the
patient’s HICN or MBI but this grace period will end in January 2020 and all claims will need to be
submitted with the patient’s MBI.
May 2018 – completed Delaware, District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia
Beginning May 2018 Alaska, American Samoa, California, Guam, Hawaii, Northern Mariana
Islands, Oregon
Beginning June 2018 Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Nebraska, North
Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin
After June 2018 Remaining states, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands
